Sporting a pin-striped suit, munching on a ham, cheese and mayonnaise sandwich and exhaling the smoke from a Parliament cigarette between sentences, Harper's magazine editor-in-chief Lewis Lapham appeared at first glance Tuesday to be the epitome of the ostensibly stuffy, white-shoed aristocratic elite.
But the acclaimed journalist's message that afternoon -- one that assailed the U.S. government's trend toward "geopolitical imperialism" -- was sharply critical of what he described as an oligarchy led by President Bush.
Addressing students and community members in Filene Auditorium, Lapham, a current Montgomery Fellow and a winner of the 1995 National Magazine Award, outspokenly criticized the present state of U.S. politics and the media coverage surrounding it.
In his speech on "The American Rome," Lapham expressed extreme dissatisfaction with the Bush administration and feels that the United States' "colossal preeminence in the world" is unfounded.
Lapham discussed the nature of American "empire" from the time of the War of 1812 and Henry Clay to the present-day war with Iraq. Yet, he affirmed that, throughout history, "As Americans, we don't have a talent or a stomach for empire and we never have."
On the present administration's policies, Lapham remarked that Bush "equates the American spirit with force, not with liberty."
The Bush administration "embodies the interest of a selfish and frightened oligarchy," he said.
The present state of politics, according to Lapham, can be defined by the idea that "fraud is just another word for freedom."
Lapham also criticized recent government measures to restrict privacy in the name of protection against terrorism. The Iraq war "gives reason to the people writing the hubristic remarks to give even more power to the federal government," he said.
Lapham proceeded to equate the war on terror to "declaring a war on an unknown enemy, an abstract noun. It's like declaring a war on lust." Thus, Lapham said, there is a great deal at stake in the upcoming election, which he referred to as an "urgent moment of national identity."
Late in his speech, Lapham stunned the crowd when he said: "The government in Washington does not bear any good will to the American people." He also spoke somewhat condescendingly of news anchor Peter Jennings, saying: "You have to think of Jennings along the lines of Donald Duck. If you understand that, it won't upset you."
Lapham also spoke to The Dartmouth about his views on the relationship between "truth and ethics" and journalism.
"Truth is not something that the media is very good at," he said. "The journalist's first objective is to obtain an audience and to tell this audience more or less what it wants to hear."
Lapham also railed against widespread "deception" found in politics and journalism.
"Politicians lie to the media and journalists lie to their sources," he said. "'Ethics' is not really a term that fits the bill."
On the other hand, Lapham argued that there exists a set of rules and conventions and it is when a journalist commits "too grotesque a violation" of those conventions, that he or she risks the betrayal of the tacit laws of journalistic integrity imposed upon by contemporary society.
Lapham, a graduate of Yale and Cambridge universities, went to work at the San Francisco Examiner in 1957 and has been publishing distinguished essays ever since.
After years of writing experience -- he has been published in myriad national newspapers and magazines including, among others, The New York Times, Life, The National Review, Vanity Fair, The London Observer, and The Wall Street Journal -- Lapham said his articles still take over a week to write and can involve up to five or six drafts.
Despite being compared to H.L. Mencken, Mark Twain and Montaigne, Lapham remained surprisingly humble to any accolades. He refers to such praise as "utter puffery with very little truth in any of it."